26 October 2010

Our objective for this performance is to teach Year 7-9 (Lutterworth High School) why bullying needs, we are allowed to focus on one specific type of bullying. It has to be 20 minutes long as it is in the space of assembly time.

My first initial reaction to the title was cyber bullying. I feel as if its a topic that isn't explained what it is very well and therefore we could teach others what is classed as cyber bullying and what isn't, using examples with acting.

The group discussed the ideas and one that has stuck out in my mind is using the idea of 'on the news' and having reporters and victims etc. This would be an effective way of getting across to the audience we are targeting because they understand the news and therefore would get the 'shock' factor of how serious bullying is.

We got given 3 stimuli's. First was a video (cannot upload at this moment)
My initial reaction was that there was hardly any information, just dates and names. This really made me think about the fact that the victims are not worth anything in the people's eyes and that they are just people.
The groups reaction included

• What about the family? How was they feel about the deaths? Many questions were raised, felt really sad and sorrow for the family for having to go through the grief because of the bullies.
• They were innocent, some of them were our age when they died.. feel gutted for them
• Everyone gets bullied, not just these select few who committed suicide, its often how you deal with it
• Penny's suggestion was that 'every action has a reaction' no matter what you do it will always affect someone.
• Most of the group felt ashamed of themselves as they were our age and if that happened to someone at our school it would be gutting because none of us helped that person. Also ashamed of the people who knew those who had committed suicide because they didn't help, and that includes family, the bullies and the people at their schools because most who were in the video were teenagers and therefore went to school.
• Is it just teenagers who get bullied?

An idea from this video would be to look into massive detail of a few of the cases and maybe re-enacting what happened to the audience, shocking them because it is true life. By shocking them we may be able to get the message to try and help reduce bullying across.

We also read through a poem

'I am'
I am the person you bullied in school
I am the one who didn't know how to be cool
I am the person you alienated
I am the person you ridiculed and hated

I am the person who sat on their own
I am the person who walked home alone
I am the person you scared every day
I am the person who had nothing to say

I am the person with hurt in their eyes
I am the person you never saw cry
I am the person living alone with their fears
I am the person destroyed by their peers

I am the person who drowned in your scorn
I am the person who wished they hadn't been born
I am the person whose name you don't know
I am the person who just can't let go

I am the person destroyed for 'fun'
I am the person, but not the only one
I am the person who had feelings too
..and I am a person, JUST LIKE YOU!!!

My initial reaction was about how simple the words/phrasing was and how much it had affected me, thinking that the simpler the storyline the better way of getting the moral across to the target audience. Most of the time simple is better.

The group also mentioned

• The repetitive words of 'I am' is making the victim stronger and if the bully ever read this to make them realise how dehumanising that person was to the victim. Its also a way of fighting back.
• It could also be a cry for help, a last resort in the victims head before that person couldn't take it any more.
• The idea of equality, and how many people get bullied for the stereotype. And how the victim feels below them, not a human. THIS SHOULDN'T HAPPEN TO ANYONE. Equality should be with everyone and anyone.
• The victim feels like an object rather than a human being.
• I felt that the author must have taken a lot of courage to write this, because the author spoke a lot of what has happened to the in the past, maybe they're on the way up.
• We also discussed how the author is possibly isolated from everyone therefore is writing their feelings onto paper, low self esteem to talk to anyone is showing.

Finally, we were given an article.

This article made me feel really angry, how can people think in this way instead of looking from the victims perspective instead of thinking about the 'cry for attention'. All the facts need to be straightened before that view can be made.

The group:

• found it horrifying, the whole idea about how she committed suicide and everything was just horrible and wrong, no-one should take their own life.
• That the person who wrote this was very insensitive and perhaps we need to be very sensitive if we use the issue of suicide.
• The idea that someone is bullying them self repulses and others and that was what the author of the article was insinuating.